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This is a monthly catch up on AI developments from December 2025, with a focus on what matters for UK legal practice.
Whilst weekly issues cover the main stories, this mop up pulls out the themes and a few items that did not make it into the weekly emails.
As of 27 December 2025, it reflects what has been published so far and should take about 5 minutes to skim.
On a personal note, I want to welcome and thank all our new subscribers! The support for the newsletter in its opening weeks has been fantastic and more than could have been hoped for! It is truly appreciated!
This month in UK Legal AI
December’s theme was governance catching up with adoption of AI. We started with practical expectations, including the Bar Council’s updated note on generative AI and what “competent use” looks like in practice, plus early signals about AI turning up in recruitment processes. See the week’s links and commentary in UK Legal AI Brief, 5 December 2025.
Mid month, it became hard to ignore firms scaling up AI. CMS moving Harvey from pilot to a firm wide platform was a useful marker for where large practices are heading. Additionally there were court warnings on hallucinated authorities which has kept the focus firmly on verification and supervision rather than drafting speed. See the week’s links and commentary in UK Legal AI Brief, 12 December 2025.
We saw a shift from experimentation to behavioural change inside firms, including incentives for everyday usage and more examples of AI in day to day service delivery. See UK Legal AI Brief, 19 December 2025.
In our final regular edition of the month, our Boxing Day edition pulled together the regulatory subtext: oversight bodies are increasingly treating generative AI as a “driver of change”, and the practical risks lawyers worry about most often are still privilege, confidentiality, and accountability, with copyright remaining a live moving piece. See UK Legal AI Brief, 26 December 2025.
AI Golden Rules
This week we also published an article reflecting the Golden Rules on using AI.
This piece is likely to be referenced often in future issues (if December is any indicator) and is intended as a live resource and the website will be reconfigured to make this page easier to find (and may already have changed by the time this post goes live).
See here: AI Golden Rules
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Stories you may have missed
HMCTS puts its AI approach on the record: A published chair’s summary of the HMCTS Strategic Engagement Group meeting includes a clear snapshot of HMCTS’s AI adoption strategy, with a focus on defined use cases (including document processing and judgment anonymisation), a “responsible AI” framework, and a stated avoidance of judicial decision making applications. This is useful context for litigators thinking about what the system itself is adopting. (GOV.UK)
LSB consultation hints at voluntary AI standards for legal tools: Alongside its sector reporting (reported in the Boxing Day Edition), the Legal Services Board launched a consultation on its draft business plan and budget for 2026/27 and explicitly floated the idea of voluntary standards for legal tools that use AI. (Legal Services Board)
President of the King’s Bench Division on AI and legitimacy risk: The Mayflower Lecture frames generative AI as a genuine efficiency opportunity but also a risk to “core legal values” if not properly regulated. A useful read if you are updating internal policies on verification, transparency, and when not to use AI. (Courts and Tribunals Judiciary)
Master of the Rolls: litigants using AI as their agent is already here: A housing sector speech flags that litigants are using AI to turn messy narratives into coherent claims and defences and suggests “agentic AI” will matter for dispute preparation and resolution. This is relevant for anyone anticipating a rise in AI assisted pleadings and the knock on case management pressures. (Courts and Tribunals Judiciary)
How did we do?
Reply and tell me what you would like included in future mop ups.
Serhan
Editor, UK Legal AI Brief
UK Legal AI Brief
Disclaimer
Guidance and news only. Not legal advice. Test outputs and apply professional judgment.